Automatic call distribution (ACD) systems are used by large businesses to accept incoming calls and to route such calls to agents for communicating with a calling customer. A typical example of an ACD is the system used by airlines to accept calls requesting reservations and tickets. The agents are grouped into teams and any call of a particular type from a particular area of the country is routed to one of these teams by a routing scheme that is sufficiently flexible to select alternate teams according to the time of day, day of week, and amount of traffic to the preferred team. The use of agent teams permits an efficient utilization of agents; queues for agent teams allows the agent teams to be used close to capacity. ACD systems take measurements to keep track of the performance of individual agents and to keep track of the level of traffic load, so a supervisor can add or subtract agents or prepare to order additional agent positions.
Call center communication systems are constantly evolving to meet the changing needs of callers along with the businesses and institutions they are calling. Several years ago, private branch exchange, automatic call distribution (PBX/ACD) systems began to incorporate customer programmable skills-based routing algorithms to improve call distribution among agents with unique skill sets. The ability to match each caller's unique requirements with an agent possessing the necessary skill set to efficiently handle the call was a major improvement over the general purpose agent environment of years past. For example, the ROLM 9751 Release 9006 ACD includes skills-based routing and agent-matching capabilities as part of its FlexRouting call distribution process. This system was one of the first call center routing programs that focused on matching callers and agents, instead of assigning calls to splits or groups. The ROLM 971 Release 9006 ACD is a product currently sold by Siemens Business Communication Systems, Inc. In some cases, some of the functions are also performed by attached servers.
Siemens Business Communication Systems, Inc. also commercially sells a ResumeRouting system, which provides five main functions for the call center operations. First, it collects caller information through combinations of automatic number identification (ANI), dialed number identification service (DNIS), voice mail call processing, interactive voice response (IVR), prompted inputs, and/or customer databases. Second, the ResumeRouting system assigns a skill resume to each call center agent that defines the agent's skill set, skill levels and call handling preferences. Third, it matches each caller's transaction requirements to agent resumes based on skill only, skill/preference, preference only, or preference/skill routing algorithms. Fourth, it empowers call center agents and supervisors via an optional application (e.g., an MS-Windows program) to monitor, reserve or assign specific calls in a queue. Finally, it enables call center systems administration and reporting through a graphical user interface (GUI). This GUI could be, for example, an OS/2 Notebook.
There are many patents which discuss telecommunication networks and/or ACD systems. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,533,115 to Hollenbach discloses a network based telephone system which provides coordination of voice and data delivery. In this reference, the system processes a phone call from a caller in a telephone network. The telephone network includes a plurality of switches and an intelligent peripheral for interfacing the plurality of switches to a service control point. The intelligent peripheral then requests that the service control point perform a call processing request. The phone call is then processed according to the call processing request, and the phone call is routed to a selected telephone based on information received from one or more external systems. The received information is also routed to the selected telephone. According to the reference, this provides greater accessibility to information from external systems by a system for processing telephone calls. This also augments the existing process of directing calls to service agents and routes a caller to the appropriate agent based on information about the caller. Finally, the call is routed to the appropriate agent while routing data associated with the call is sent to a display terminal of the same agent.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,633,924 to Kaish discloses a telecommunication network with an integrated network-wide ACD system. In this reference, an intelligent node in the system can access an agent queue that stores data. This data indicates the availability of agent communication terminals to handle the call in a call queue, which stores data concerning calls waiting for ACD service. A database stores processing instructions for the handling of incoming calls based on data contained in the agent and call queues, and in the subscriber specified instructions. The control node is coupled to the agent queue, and the call queue determines the availability of an agent communication terminal to accept a call being held based on data stored in the agent queue. The node then selects the call to be routed to an available agent communication terminal based on the call-waiting data in the call queue and the subscriber handling instructions. The node then sends routing instructions to the switch, and call-waiting time is minimized by efficiently matching individual agent communication terminals with calls awaiting ACD service.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,703,943 to Otto provides for the completion of calls to a preferred agent in an ACD system. In this reference, callers to an ACD system are frequently assigned to a preferred agent for handling their transactions. When these callers call the basic telephone number of the ACD system, they are identified and routed preferably, to the preferred agent if that agent is logged on. Callers can normally be served by the same agent while still having the advantage of having their calls queued to any available agent of the ACD system if the preferred agent for handling a caller or handling a transaction is not available.
What is needed is simplification of the management and training of ACD agents in a skill-based routing system. It is difficult to predict the calling patterns that surround new announcements, product introductions, and the like. For example, one cannot predict how many internationally trained agents an airline will need to handle the calls generated by a fare war on flights to London. A dynamic solution is needed to provide the most efficient use of available resources. In the above described systems, training delivery and call routing are two separate, disconnected functions. A supervisor might notice that certain queues are growing unacceptably long and, in order to compensate, could manually schedule training classes for more employees to learn a desired skill. After the completion of the training, the administrator could manually update the skills of the agents in a skills database. What is needed is an automated solution for addressing the problem of not having enough trained agents for a particular type of call. It is desirable to have both an interactive system that monitors the queue and delivers training automatically, to ensure a balance of trained agents readily available to meet the demands of the incoming calls. It is also desirable to avoid manual intervention and take advantage of worker idle time.